On Saturday 09 April we did a "one off" possibly never to be repeated double act, where we took both the senior and the very new junior bands out on one performance. This was for Charles Banks of Mulderboch and Fable Mountain Vinyards who has been particularly supportive of this initiave and we have much to thank him for.Other than the opening night of the Marimba School, this is the first time that the juniors performed in front of an audience. Everyone was very excited and the seniors showed special attention and pride in their protege.The juniors first started playing marimbas in December 2015 and now play 12 songs faultlessly. The two bands started together playing these songs that they both knew and then the juniors stepped aside and watched the seniors performing on their own, upping the game bit.We were extremely proud of the way that the juniors conducted themselves and performed as were we of the way the seniors took the lead and showed the juniors the way forward.We have exciting things lined up and if we have learnt anything in the past couple of years with this group, it is this!

Have a DreamBelieve in it.Do what you can towards achiving it

You will be amazed what you can achieve.We have achieved many dreams and goals in this way.Our plans for 2016 are to start African Dancing and Drumming, involve no less than 50 children in the school and to source a vehicle for easy transport. We also wish to create one or two permanent posts. We may not achieve all of this by the end of the year, but we will make a good go of it and get there sooner or later.

It has for some time now been our dream to form a marimba school in Wolseley in order to sustain what we have all put into, to achieve what we have with the marimba band since inception in September 2012. In 2015, five of the original eight members, finished their schooling and this made their future with the band uncertain as they set out to persue careers etc.

To this end we registered the AWCA (amaWolseley Cultural Association NPO as without this vehicle we would be unable to access the financial assistance in order to achieve our dreams. After a lot of work, we finally managed to get a grant from the Department of Arts and Culture at the end of 2015 to allow us to put plans in place and we are very excited to open the school last evening with 9 new band members, being taught by the existing band members.Our plans for the futre involve plans to start an African dancing group and a drumming circle. These activities will involve more youth on a smaller budget an we intend to increase the children benefiting from the school to 50 by the end of 2016. Our other main drive is to get a vehicle to transport the members to and from gigs. Until now we have relied on our private vehicle and it is simply not big enough any more and safety restrictions do not make it legal.Thank you to all our supporters and we look forward to updating you of our activities.

We are a couple of months behind chedule, but I am excited to announce that today we started the refurbishing process on the Wolseley Marimba School which is to be opened soon. Thanks to Corne Muller who is assisting us with the work and to AAA paint in Worcester who gave us paint and materials at cost. There are other role players who have assisted us and will be thanked in person as we go along. Watch this space and we look forward to udating you on progress.

It was a huge privilege to perform at the Vineyard Hotel in Cape Town for a special ladies 90th Birthday celebration. This wonderful Birthday girl and her husband of 92 years both arrived unaided looking sprightly and fit of body and mind. Many of the guests were over 80 years old and had the energy of under 40's. The recipe was definitely this groups love for music, song and dance and their strong family values. It was a wonderful day and the marimba band got many people up on the dance floor showing some amazing moves of yesteryear. Thank you to the Stephenson family for this amazing opportunity.

Today the Marimba Band performed in Round 2 of SA's Got Talent. Unfortunately it was the end of the road for them and as we were very excited on how far they had gone, they were very disappointed. On our return home they met up with one of their hero's at Engine One Stop which made their day. Siya Kolisi is now on his way to represent the Springbuck team at the World cup. Good Luck SA.

In May this year we were very blessed to receive a generous donation from the Rondebosch United Church of their old set of marimba instruments. These instruments are currently being refurbished and will kick start the marimba school under the "amaWolseley Cultural Association" management in order to give more children in our community this opportunity. See here they are pictured with the youth group after a wonderful morning at the church where the hand over took place. This will give us the opportunity to extend this program to more children in the community and we are extremely grateful to Pastor Robert Steiner and his congregation for their generosity. This will make a huge difference to our local community.

The amaWolseley Cultural Association has finally been formed and we have managed to get registration as Non Profit Organisation. This might seem a small thing to most, but you have no idea how many hoops it has taken to get this done. What this means to us, is that we can now approach big organizations who would like to sponsor us and they are able to get tax exemption. With funding that we believe we will get, we plan to open the "Wolseley Cultural School" and get the present members of the band to start teaching other youngsters from the community to play marimbas. This will ensure that there will forever be the sounds of marimbas ringing through the Witzenberg Valley.We have many more plans for this NPO which we will reveal in good time as each goal is reached.

If there is anyone out there who would like to contribute to this worthy cause, our details are as follows:

We are very excited about the year ahead and have got some big plans. The first exciting thing is that we were awarded NPO (Non Profit Organisation) status towards the end of December 2014. Our NPO Number is 146-689 NPO. This development allows us to formalize things and apply for government funding to enable us to start the "amaWolseley Cultural Association". Our plans here are to source a venue in the town of Wolseley and to use the current band members to pass on their skills to another group of aspirant marimba band players. We will source a second set of marimbas for this purpose and the current members will earn an income whilst training. This will ensure that there will forever be the wonderful sounds of marimbas ringing through the Witzenberg Valley. Once this is up and running, we can look to drumming circles and many other activities.When we asked the group what they would like to achieve in 2015, the answeres were as follows:Travel to Australia Go back to LATravel to basically anywhereParticipate in "South Africa has got talent"Cut another CD with more songsParticipate in the Cape Town Marimba Festival in April

We will see how many of these boxes we can tick in the coming year, but whatever happens we are sure it will be positive and upward from here for these members and others of their community.